I have a simple animation inside a symbol called “Bug_Box_Glow”. At the end of the symbol’s timeline there is an Timeline Action: Go to Time in TImeline, Main Timeline (which I guess means the main timeline of the symbol?), Time 00:00:00 This should cause the symbol’s timeline to go back to the start and stop, if I understand correctly how timelines work in HYPE. However, when I trigger the symbol’s time line from a button using this:
var symbolInstance = hypeDocument.getSymbolInstanceById(‘Bug_Box_Glow’);
symbolInstance.startTimelineNamed(‘Main Timeline’, hypeDocument.kDirectionForward);
What happens is that the Bug_Box_Glow timeline plays to the end, and when it hits the Timeline Action to return to the start, it starts playing from the start again, rather than stopping at 00:00:00.
Is there a way I can get the symbol to actually stop rather than continuously loop?
I see. Thanks for checking it out. I wonder if there is work around for what I need to do. Maybe js could be used? Though I’m not sure how that would work in HYPE. Basically I’d need to tell the timeline of a symbol to go to a particular position and stop. But that timeline would then need to be free to start again when triggered by another button.
Can anyone give me an idea of how to amend my code to include a pause?
var symbolInstance = hypeDocument.getSymbolInstanceById(‘Bug_Box_Glow’);
symbolInstance.startTimelineNamed(‘Main Timeline’, hypeDocument.kDirectionForward);
I tried to do all this using the built in actions but I could see no way to choose one of the symbol’s timelines. The choices are Main Timeline and create new. But I could see no way of accessing the already existing timelines of symbols.
I went the "Timeline" route here - along with a "Custom Behavior" - no scripting. After You read this post revisit @h_classen & @MarkHunte's replies - I believe this was what they were referencing.
Details:
Step 1
Open the Symbol called "Symbol Pink Square" to view the timeline "Timeline 1" (could have used "Main Timeline" for this Symbol instead). The element "Pink Square" inside the Symbol simply moves to the right over a (3) second time period.
At (3) seconds there is a "Timeline Action" with two parts:
• "Go To Time in Timeline..." (Time: "0" seconds) followed by a
• "Pause Timeline" - both set for "Timeline 1".
Step 2
In the symbol "Symbol Pink Square" I created a "Custom Behavior" (near bottom of the "Symbol Inspector") called "Custom01" which Continues... "Timeline 1", and has the "Can restart timeline" box checked.
Step 3
A button was created and assigned a "Trigger Custom Behavior..." action using the "Custom01" behavior in the "On Mouse Click" handler of the "Actions Inspector".
Thanks for this Jim! The only thing is, I need to play a timeline which is inside a symbol. How do I use the method above to play, not the main timeline, but a specific symbol’s timeline?
The other problem I’m having in general being new to HYPE, is how symbol’s timelines work. It looks like every symbol (when you double click to go inside it) has it’s own timeline. However you can also create timelines in HYPE and then choose to start any timeline with a button. However, I can’t see a way of creating a named timeline inside a symbol. When I am in a symbol, all timelines except MainTimeline are greyed out. It’s all rather confusing (despite having read about timelines in the manual. It may be because I’m coming from Flash and Edge Animate that I’m thinking in the wrong way.
Many of the things I need to do involve triggering an stopping animations which are inside symbols. So I need to selectively start and stop timelines inside symbols from buttons outside these symbols and from inside the symbol. Basically any or all combinations of these things. Is all this possible with HYPE?
I think I’m getting the idea of custom behaviours and how I can use then to control different timelines. Many thanks for that. What I can’t figure out is how to name the timeline for each individual symbol, so that I can control them. If I create a new timeline, I am not able to select it when I’m inside a symbol (it is greyed out). Is there another way to make a symbol have it’s own named timeline?
When I create a new timeline from within a symbol, that timeline does not show up in the Action lists outside the symbol or in the Animation Timelines in the scene panel. This means I can’t then trigger the symbol’s timeline from outside the symbol.
1, create a timeline inside a symbol. ie name the timeline Foo
2, create a custom behaviour inside a symbol. Give it a name that describes what it does. i.e startSymbolTimeLineFoo
3, Set the Actions for the custom behaviour to trigger your timeline in step 1.
Outside of the symbol and in any Action you can the set the action to Trigger Custom Behaviour and the Behaviour name to : startSymbolTimeLineFoo
You can create a named timeline inside a symbol but that timeline cannot be seen in any inspector outside the symbol.
However you can create a custom behaviour inside the symbol (because that’s the only way to reference it’s timeline in an inspector).
Custom behaviours can be referenced via an inspector from outside the symbol even if it was created inside a symbol. This allows a symbol’s timeline (otherwise invisible outside the symbol) to be referenced from outside the symbol.
